I am curious to hear from both instructors and students to the students: how important is your diet and exercise routine to you when it comes to pursuing your goals in martial arts.

To the instructors: Do you ever talk to your students about good nutrition and how often have you seen students eating overly processed foods right before a training session and how has this affected their performance in your class?

I place high emphasis on nutrition and physical fitness. There is an epidemic of obesity/overweightness (invented word?), inflexibility, general poor physical conditioning in the BJK community. I've seen this in nearly every dojo including Japan.

Posted on: 2013/8/22 10:26

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"The most terrible job in warfare is to be a second lieutenant leading a platoon when you are on the battlefield."~Dwight D. Eisenhower

I believe that most people attempt to compensate for low physical strength or athletic ability with a martial art and that is what initially drives them to take any type of training. This unfortunately can lead to a potentially deadly false sense of security once this person trains for a little while and believes their techniques or lessons learned will apply universally in a combat/self-defense situation.

Also, "self-defense" is not the same as "martial art", often misunderstood to be interchangeable.

"I am highly trained in this martial art/school/style therefore, I can defend myself if necessary." is often not true, probably almost opposite to actual combat.

A good teacher of any school will acknowledge and profess the capabilities and applications as well as the limitations of whatever they teach their students.

Posted on: 2013/8/26 7:54

_________________
"The most terrible job in warfare is to be a second lieutenant leading a platoon when you are on the battlefield."~Dwight D. Eisenhower